North Korea's nuclear program and East Asia's security
North Korea's nuclear program and East Asia's security
WRITTEN BY JOE VARNER
1 April 2020
On Monday, March 30th 2020, North Korea announced that it had lost all appetite for dialogue with the United States and warned that it is now compelled to pay back, “the pains the United States has imposed on our people. “
A great deal of water has passed under the proverbial bridge since the United States started in 1994 negotiating with North Korea over its nascent nuclear weapons program. In 2002 the administration of George W Bush announced that North Korea was pursuing nuclear weapons in violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Pact and the agreements signed with the Clinton Administration. By 2003 North Korea had withdrawn from the Non-Proliferation Pact and no doubt influenced by the fate of Saddam Hussein’s regime that same year, declared that it had nuclear capabilities. Pyongyang delivered on that boast in July 2006 when it firstly test-fired a long-range missile leading to further sanctions from the UN security Council and secondly conducted a small but successful test of a nuclear device.
In the first few months of the Obama administration on 25 May 2009, the Hermit Kingdom conducted a second nuclear test, followed by a third test on February 2013 the first under Kim Jong-un and during a period of sustained tensions on the Korean penninsula.
Since January 2016, North Korea has vastly expanded its arsenal and its abilities to strike at South Korea, Japan and th continental United States. In that month it announced a successful Hydrogen Bomb test and later, on 9 March declared it had miniaturized nuclear weapons for placement in nuclear warheads for its missile force. In September North Korea tested another hydrogen device in the10 kiloton range.
In 2017 North Korea successfully test-fired its first Inter Continental Ballistic Missile (ICBM), sparking a well publicised rebuke by President Donald J Trump. Nonetheless Pyongyang conducted its sixth nuclear test later in the year that created a 6.3 magnitude seismic event, resulting in tremors in northern China. Its recent test of the KN-23 road-mobile, solid-fuel Short-Range Ballistic Missile (SRBM) that resembles in appearance and general performance of Russia’s Iskander has heightened fears about the increasingly capable strategic missile forces under Kim Jong Un’s command.
For South Korea and Japan, Kim Jong-un’s nuclear forces represent a real credible threat to their societies and cities. South Korean troops on the Demilitarized Zone and Seoul itself are highly vulnerable to attack with conventional weapons.
All of this has led to questions about the impact of a fully nuclear-armed North Korea and the Indo-Pacific’s security and nuclear proliferation architecture.
The Hermit Kingdom’s nuclear capabilities
North Korea’s military is some 1,280,000 strong with a strategic nuclear forces program that is believed to be comprised of 10,000 military personnel. It is estimated to have a small number of nuclear devices with warheads likely numbering between 20 and 30. U.S. and allied intelligence believes there is additional capability within North Korea to construct some 30-60 more weapons.
United States intelligence further estimated that in 2017 Pyongyang produced enough weapons grade plutonium and enriched uranium for production of 12 nuclear weapons per year while other estimates are half that number. In 2020 however it is estimated that North Korea will have between 20-100 nuclear weapons with a number of potential delivery systems including 80 obsolete H-5 Soviet-era Il-28 Beagle bombers and dual capable ballistic missile systems.
North Korea has road mobile liquid fueled Hawsong-13, Hwasong-14 and Hwasong-15 ICBMs that are believed to have the capability to hit most areas of the continental United States. The Hwasong-15 appears to still be in testing. It possesses Hwasong-12 Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles (IRBMs), that are platform launched and liquid-fueled and some extended range ER SCUD missiles re-engineered from Soviet-era systems. It also has a number of Hwasong-10 Musadan MRBM in testing.
The Kim regime has also successfully tested a Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile (SLBM) KN-11 Pukguksong-1 and is in deployment on a longer range solid fueled road-mobile MRBM in the KN-15 Pukguksong-2. It is believed that North Korea is in development of a KN-26 Pukguksong-3 SLBM.
Lastly, the North possesses a series of older SRBMs of the SCUD series rockets including B, C, D systems in addition to the KN-23 SRBM. In all, estimates put the country’s Hwasong ballistic missile series holdings at more than 1000 weapons. It is worth mentioning that North Korea also has a sizeable stockpile of Chemical agents some 25000-5000 tons including mustard, phosgene gas and sarin nerve and V-agent and an offensive biological warfare program likely with Anthrax and Smallpox.
In real terms, North Korea’s conventional armed forces, while large, lacks in quality, and for this reason it has developed asymmetric capabilities in terms of its Cyber, Chemical Biological and Nuclear weapons. The North has a sizeable array of ballistic missiles, but their accuracy is still a subject of question.
Many use old Soviet Cold War-era guidance systems but there are suggestions that the newer systems may employ GPS guidance systems. If their nuclear strategy is to bust cities and threaten population centers, then accuracy may not be as much of an issue. As well, it is unclear what nuclear payload their missiles can carry even on North Korean ICBMs. Questions remain about the robustness of their warheads and their ability to survive re-entry in the Earth’s atmosphere. We do know that each nuclear test has been more powerful than the last and it seems logical that if they have not perfected their warhead design and re-entry vehicle that they will do so very soon.
The fact that many of Pyongyang’s missiles are road mobile is a limited advantage in a game of hide and seek in a country that does not have a great deal of roads. Many of the launches have been from bases or prepared sites. The fact that the missiles are liquid fueled makes them vulnerable to discovery and attack due to the length in time of getting them ready for launch. There is an advantage in increase launch weight to throw weight ratio with liquid fueled rockets, but they have a more durable boost phase thus more vulnerable to attack.
The reality however is that North Korea and its Kim Jong-un now have a small but capable nuclear deterrent that can now credibly threaten its regional neighbours and the United States. As of writing, they do not have a triad or a survivable second-strike capability, but by all accounts continue to work towards one via a growing fleet of large ballistic missile submarines.
Implications for the Indo-Pacific region
So, what is the impact or implications of North Korea’s nuclear forces on Pacific security? China and Russia, two of its major neighbors, both seem to be enablers of the Hermit Kingdom’s nuclear program and cautiously support the regime with trade and capital investment.
China plays the greatest role being North Korea’s tradition ally and long-time protector, and a divided Korean peninsula remain’s in China’s strategic interest. North Korean transporter erector vehicles for its ICBMs appear to be derivatives of heavy Chinese logging trucks. The Iskander like SRBM raises many questions about foreign assistance by the Russian Federation. Both Beijing and Moscow are known to violate the UN sanctions regime and support Pyongyang’s role as a spoiler in challenging the United States, Japan and South Korea.
Even China and Russia have their limits however and given the erratic nature of North Korea under Kim Jong-un both have placed increased numbers of troops on their borders, notably in 2017 when tensions spiked. In the even of regime collapse, neither country wants hordes of North Korean refugees crossing onto its borders.
For South Korea and Japan, Kim Jong-un’s nuclear forces represent a real credible threat to their societies and cities. South Korean troops on the Demilitarized Zone and Seoul itself are highly vulnerable to attack with conventional weapons and the KN-23 SRBM is geared to defeat local air defenses because of its flight characteristics that are like Russia’s Iskander.
The population density in South Korean cities is such that casualties in even a convention war would be staggering. Japan’s cities are also held hostage by North Korean nuclear weapons and missiles and United States President, Donald Trump, has caused both South Korea and Japan to question the United States nuclear umbrella and security guarantee. Both have invested in more sophisticated air defenses, F-35 stealth fighter aircraft and stand-off weapons to strike at North Korean missile systems should that become necessary.
Both have questioned their own long-standing policies that have been against developing nuclear arsenal. Both have the capacity to field re-engineered long-range missiles and nuclear warheads relatively quickly with Japan being able to do so within two years.
This has not happened to date, and it is likely that Beijing would react allergically to a nuclear armed Japan or South Korea. Taiwan, an ally of the United States, and mortal enemy of China might find its security comprised and threatened by North Korea in a conflict with the United States, but for now, it is a low key small trading partner of the Hermit Kingdom. Australia and New Zealand even at its distance from Pyongyang is threatened by North Korea as close allies of the United States in the South Pacific. North Korean ICBMs can now threaten Canada and most, if not all, of the continental United States.
North Korean military strategy for fighting a successful conventional or hybrid war with South Korea hinges on having nuclear forces to threaten American bases in the Pacific and its Pacific allies while threatening the United States’ cities at home with nuclear destruction.
On a final point, North Korea presents a special proliferation problem in its closeness to the Iranian regime which has seen cooperation on weapons of mass destruction programs. As North Korea perfects its nuclear weapons and long-range ICBM and IRBM missile programs there is always the fear that Pyongyang might sell the technology to Tehran for cash.
Very sadly, the ‘Genie is out of the bottle’ and North Korea as a nuclear power is here to stay because Kim Jong-un and the Kim family regime depend on it for ultimate survival. Kim knows the history of dictators who give up their weapons of mass destruction and it is not a bright one.
DISCLAIMER: All views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent that of the 9DASHLINE.com platform.
Author biography
Joe Varner is a former Director of Policy to Canada's Minister of Defence and a Fellow of the Conference of Defence Associations Institute and the Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society. Image credit: CC BY-NC 4.0/U.S. Pacific Command/Flickr.